The twirled moustache strikes you first on the tall figure that frequents Coghill Street, New World Whitianga, and Thames Music and Drama productions – well, that’s where I tend to run into Gary Nevin.
He coached me at Hot Water Beach Junior Surf ‘Nippers’, and his sculpted ladies and flying pigs have sat around my home since I was a kid.
Growing up, a trip to his earth house felt like stepping into a mythical world. So, it’s a privilege to feature this local artist here.
“When I was 20 I knew I wanted to be an artist,” Gary says. “But I realised I needed somewhere to get established.”
That somewhere became the Coromandel. After almost buying a $1000 section at Little Bay, a phone call from his father alerted him to land at Cooks Beach, which he bought sight unseen.
By the late ’80s, newly married with a baby on the way, he and Julie had built a house and opened a pottery business.
“My favourite was the pūkeko with chunky legs, which was copied all over NZ,” he says. “Potters didn’t have much imagination … things have changed thankfully.”
Gardening was also a passion, making up part-time and off-season work, including shaping trees into lollipop forms at Flaxmill Bay Resort. He spent 15 summers volunteering at Hot Water Beach ‘Nippers’, finding out years later his own kids only went for the pies afterward!
There was also the Cooks Beach Film Society – “formed with other reprobates” – and often fuelled by feijoa wine.
One night, Gary checked the projector mid-screening.
“It was going great,” he says. “But the whole reel had spun onto the floor – just a pool of long black liquorice straps. The room emptied pretty fast that night.”
Twenty-five years ago, Gary and Julie took on their biggest project yet: an earth house in Whenuakite. What began as a paddock piled with subsoil, after years of shovelling and determination, became home.
These days, his art materials have shifted to cement, concrete and corten steel.
“The best thing about any place is the people, and the Coromandel is full of all sorts of characters,” he says.
He reflects on the environmental strain caused by the influx of people, citing the need for more marine reserves.
“Back in the 70s it was a great alternative lifestyle, but these days it seems to have become a great retirement village – and why not?! A great atmosphere and climate, to me it’s the best place in the world.”
Photo by Marion Manson
Words by Ayana Piper-Healion
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